logo
episode-header-image
Jun 7
55m 43s

N.K Jemisin

Bbc World Service
About this episode

In this episode of World Book Club, Harriet talks with one of the world’s best-loved sci-fi and fantasy authors, the four time Hugo award winner N.K Jemisin. Which of her plethora of books did we choose? Her 10th novel, and love letter to New York, ‘The City We Became’.

The story takes place in a world in which major cities become sentient, living beings. After New York is attacked by an otherworldly enemy, five people, champions representing each of the city’s five boroughs, must band together to save the city, but also humanity itself.

Rich with sharp social commentary, vibrant characters, and breathtaking world-building, it’s a gripping, imaginative tale of identity, belonging, and the power of unity in the face of otherworldly, eldritch chaos.

N.K Jemisin will be answering questions from our World Book Club - including how she created characters that embody each of New York’s five boroughs, what makes a city ‘alive’, and how she confronted, and subverted, Lovecraftian tropes to create the enemy of all humanity, the Woman in White.

Presented by Harriett Gilbert. Produced by Elizabeth Ann Duffy.

Photo Credit - Laura Hanifin

Up next
Jul 5
Graeme Macrae Burnet
On this episode of ‘World Book Club’ Harriett Gilbert speaker with with Graeme Macrae Burnet about his riveting historical crime novel ‘His Bloody Project’ Set in a remote Scottish community in the 1800s, the story centres on a brutal triple murder and the person who admits guilt ... Show More
49m 20s
May 3
Abdulrazak Gurnah: Paradise
Harriett Gilbert talks with Nobel laureate Abdulrazak Gurnah about his hauntingly beautiful novel Paradise.It tells the story of Yusuf, a 12 year-old boy living in East Africa at the beginning of the 20th Century. Sold off to settle his father’s debts, Yusuf embarks on a journey ... Show More
49m 26s
Apr 5
Michelle de Kretser: Scary Monsters
Harriett Gilbert talks with Michelle de Kretser about her eighth novel, Scary Monsters, which won the 2023 Rathbones Folio Fiction Prize.This diptych novel consists of the tale of two immigrants, one in the past, and one in a dystopian future that seems all too possible. Which st ... Show More
49m 20s
Recommended Episodes
May 7
Super Soul Special: Mariel Hemingway and Bobby Williams: Finding Soul Connections
Original Air Date: December 6, 2017 Would you like more fun, love, laughter and adventure in your life? Oscar-nominated actress and best-selling author Mariel Hemingway and her boyfriend, Bobby Williams, a stuntman and extreme athlete, say they have the answers to living a simple ... Show More
32m 25s
May 2024
Birth trauma, Sleepwalking, Lolita Chakrabarti
How many women have decided not to have more children after a traumatic birth? The UK’s first inquiry into traumatic childbirth has found that too often poor care is normalised, with devastating effects on women’s mental and physical health. Nuala McGovern talks to one Woman’s Ho ... Show More
57m 20s
May 2023
Jessica Stilling, "After the Barricades" (DX Varos, 2023)
Today I talked to Jessica Stilling about her new novel After the Barricades (DX Varos, 2023).After her mother dies in a tragic accident, Anna cleans out her closet and finds a striking painting that she’d never seen before. She also finds a trove of letters from Stefan Terre, a n ... Show More
29m 22s
Feb 2025
The After House by Mary Roberts Rinehart ~ Full Audiobook
The After House by Mary Roberts Rinehart audiobook. Imagine yourself transported to the early 20th century, surrounded by the opulence and extravagance of the wealthy elite, as you delve into the captivating world of 'The After House' by Mary Roberts Rinehart, a masterful tale of ... Show More
5h 51m
Aug 2023
The F-Word Miniseries: Gabor Maté on Feelings
Welcome to The How To Fail F-Word miniseries! Three days, three guests, three different F-words.Today, we start with Gabor Maté...on feelings.Gabor is a renowned speaker, physician and author; a practitioner who has revolutionised our understanding of stress, addiction and childh ... Show More
58m 17s
May 16
One Golden Summer With Carley Fortune
This week on Barely Famous, Kail sits down with New York Times bestselling author Carley Fortune, the mind behind viral romance hits Every Summer After, Meet Me at the Lake, and the brand-new release One Golden Summer. Carley opens up about her writing process, the real-life insp ... Show More
54m 39s
Nov 2023
Poirot & The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb - Agatha Christie
Mystery Sleep Story - Poirot Investigates The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb. Join famed detective Hercule Poirot as he investigates a series of peculiar and sinister events surrounding an ancient Egyptian burial site. Hercule Poirot is called upon to solve a perplexing mystery i ... Show More
49m 58s
Mar 2025
From The New Yorker Radio Hour: Rachel Aviv on Alice Munro’s Family Secrets
Alice Munro, a winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, was perhaps the most acclaimed short-story writer of our time. After her death, last year, her youngest daughter, Andrea Skinner, revealed that Munro’s partner, Gerald Fremlin, had sexually abused her starting when she was n ... Show More
32m 13s